


Eurydice and the Pillar of Salt

by Anonymous



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Amnesia, Angst with a Happy Ending, Childhood Sweethearts, Community: dragonage_kink, Halward Pavus' A+ Parenting, M/M, Protective Big Brother Leto, Reunions, Slavery, Tevinter Imperium
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-28
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-11 19:26:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4449260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just keep moving forwards; look back, and you're lost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I HAVE FOUND MYSELF WITH A GUILTY PLEASURE PAIRING SEND HELP
> 
> ALSO MY INTERNET IS PATCHY AND GETTING THIS UPLOADED FROM MY PHONE WAS A PAIN SEND DIVINE INTERVENTION

_Skyhold_  
  
Varric drew him aside with the sort of sad smile that always meant trouble was coming, and he knew it would end with one or another of the people he cared about getting hurt.  
  
“You won’t be the only ‘vint in Skyhold,” he warned him. “There are two others: A Soporati, who’s the second in command of a mercenary group the Inquisition’s hired, and an Altus mage.”  
  
“You have a magister in your Inquisition,” Fenris more stated than asked.  
  
“He’s not a magister,” Varric corrected wearily. “And he means well, doesn’t use blood magic, and is really learning to hate slavery just like the rest of us. He’s… been through some shit, at home. Just try not to kill him, alright?”  
  
“I always try not to commit murder when I’m staying over as a guest.”  
  
“Since when?” Varric grumbled, but nodded in acceptance of his promise. “Okay, let’s get this over with.”

* * *

_The Free Marches_  
  
This particular group of slavers was a small bunch: perhaps a dozen armed and more competently trained than usual men and a score of captives, all collared and chained, some obviously drugged, and one manacled in the center of a wheeled cage some distance from the main camp, spitting invectives at any slaver who drew near. Some of them were Tevene invectives. These were slave hunters, then, rather than ordinary slavers, Fenris surmised: those who specialized in the retrieval of lost property rather than the capture of new.  
  
He waited until night was truly upon them to act. The caged man would be the first he freed: he was some distance away, and if the slavers took such precautions with him, it was likely that he had some skills as a fighter. This would be a job more easily done with allies.  
  
Not for the first time since striking out on his own, he missed Hawke, he missed Isabela, Sebastian, Varric and Aveline, he even missed the abomination and the blood mage, if for no other reason than they’d been useful in a fight.  
  
“ _Inanitas te perdat_ , she can’t be older than fourteen you-”

Fenris would have put the terrified, sobbing girl that had been dragged away from the main camp at closer to twelve, but it was dark, this far away from the fire, and humans couldn’t see as well as elves in the murk.  
  
“Are you jealous, Altus?” the slaver asked with a laughed.  
  
“Fuck you,” the man snarled. An illegitimate son of a magister, perhaps? A slave mother made a slave child, but that didn’t stop people from being able to guess one’s heritage.  
  
“Wouldn’t you rather I fuck you?” the slaver asked, moving around the cage to face the captive man head on. It meant that the cage was blocking the view of the man from the fire. It meant that he’d left his back exposed to Fenris. “Isn’t that what you’re-”  
  
Whatever the man was going to say was lost as Fenris stabbed him through the chest. He made a quiet gurgle, and then he lowered the body to the ground.  
  
“Can you fight?” he hissed at the captive.  
  
“Get me out of these chains and I’ll light the lot of them on fire,” the man promised. A mage then- definitely some magister’s son.  
  
That was something to be dealt with later, if at all. For now, he could use the help. He freed the man as quickly and quietly as he could. The man was less quiet, first hissing at the girl to hide under the cage, and then whispering details of who they’d be fighting to Fenris: the man with the maul favored his left side, the woman with the scar over her eye feared flames and would panic easily, leave the short, red-haired bowsman to him, he owed him a good turn.  
  
Fenris could respect that. He could also respect how well the man fought, considering he was without a staff. The battle ended quickly, and when it was over Fenris went to unchain the captive while the mage went for the wagon, emerging with a large, heavy trunk which he dragged close to the fire.  
  
“All of our staves are in here,” he explained as he began to search through the bodies for keys.  
  
All of- “You’re all mages,” Fenris said flatly.  
  
The mage rolled his eyes at his tone. “And we’re not about turn into demons, I-”  
  
He looked up at Fenris then, and abruptly stopped speaking, his mouth hanging open and his eyes wide with shock. He made a strangled sort of noise, and then coughed.  
  
“… _Leto_?” he managed eventually.  
  
Before Fenris could demand an explanation, and unused lightning grenade exploded on the belt of the corpse he’d been pawing over. The mage’s eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he collapsed in a dead faint.

* * *

_The Tevinter Imperium_  
  
Dorian’s life peaked at the age of fifteen, or so it felt like at times. When he was fifteen, little Varania started frosting over the glass windows in the kitchen, announcing the whole household that a mage had manifested amongst the slaves.  
  
And not just any slave- she was Leto’s sister. _His_ Leto.  
  
Father had already sent word to a judge, and was making arrangements. The whole family would be freed, of course. Varania would attend the Circle of Vyrantium, in one of the less prestigious academies, to be sure, but still in the same area as Dorian, and Leto and their mother would be moved into the townhouse House Pavus kept there, working as whatever it was the liberati servants they paid did. It didn’t matter. What matter was that Leto was going to be free, that his whole family was going to be free.  
  
Leto would still be a Soporatus, true, but surely it looked better to have a Soporati friend than a slave friend. And he was such an accomplished fighter, so strong, surely no one would question his desire to hire him as a body guard? His father had always intended that Leto be kept for that purpose, after all.  
  
He could show Leto so much- there had been so much he’d wanted to show the other boy but couldn’t: the exhibits in the Arcanist Hall, the bird-eating plants in Magister Pallieon’s botanical gardens. There were so many places you couldn’t bring a slave who wasn't officially your bodyguard, but he could bring Leto now as freedman.  
  
There was so much he could do with Leto now, provided Leto agreed.  
  
“I’ll make sure she’s doing alright,” he promised the other boy. He didn’t want to seem _too_ eager, and it wasn’t like he minded spending time with Varania. She just wasn’t Leto. “We’ll spend weekends doing sight-seeing and operas for a while. Word will get around that she’s under the protection of House Pavus, and she’ll become familiar with the city. You could come too?”  
  
They were sitting on the low garden wall outside of the kitchens. The moons were very nearly full, though Leto’s eyes were still glowing slightly in the murk. They’d been drinking- not much, but Dorian had been allowed five entire glasses of champagne at dinner, and he was so happy that he felt like he was made of the bubbles. Their legs knocked together against the wall.  
  
They were of a height, despite the three-year different in their ages. Leto had all but stopped growing, tall and broad for an elf, though it was still surprising to see him swinging his greatsword through the air like a child’s toy; Dorian was still shooting up, and growing into his frame.  
  
When they turned to face each other, Dorian could feel the other boy’s breath on his lips.  
  
He knew what he was at that age- had known for years. He’d been twelve when he knew for sure, when Leto had hoisted him up to grab some tangerines from the orchards. It was a habit of theirs: Dorian didn’t like tangerines very much, but Leto did, and he wouldn’t get in trouble if he’d only been helping Dorian to steal them. He steadied Dorian with a hand on his hip and smiled when Dorian declared every tangerine but the smallest to be of inferior quality and therefore Leto’s to have, and he’d suddenly connected the fluttering feeling in his chest to the feeling of being in love.  
  
He'd never been in love before, but he knew what it was.

But Leto was a slave, and Dorian had already received the lecture on how much shame he would bring upon House Pavus if he was caught being _overly familiar_ with the slaves. And he’d read the works of various axiologists, discussing how accepting the affections of their masters was a duty for slaves to bear, like field work or cleaning or anything else that slaves did.  
  
He didn’t like the idea of Leto viewing his affections like field work. But Leto was as good as free now- he’d be truly free by this time tomorrow. Would it really matter if-  
  
Before Dorian could decide, Leto did it for him, leaning forwards just enough to press their lips together.  
  
Dorian had no idea what he was doing. He hadn’t really thought that far ahead. He just pushed forwards towards Leto, every half-formed idea of kissing that he’d ever entertained swirling around in his head, and then he overbalanced and toppled into the garden.  
  
“Ow,” he said sheepishly as Leto swung down to crouch beside him with far more grace.  
  
“Are you alright?” he asked.  
  
“Yes, I-” he licked his lips, and then decided that he could hardly humiliate himself further by just asking. “Can we try that again, please?”  
  
Leto smiled. He could feel it in the curve of his lips when he pressed them to Dorian’s mouth.  
  
He did much better the second time, his arms wound around Leto’s neck, his mouth opening for his tongue. He suckled on it- had a vague idea that was a thing to do- and Leto made a noise that sent sparks down Dorian’s spine.  
  
_Oh, Maker,_ he thought. _I’m going to lose my virginity on the tomatoes._  
  
He wouldn’t have minded, if that had been how things went, but they hadn’t gone that way at all. The moment after that, Father discovered them, and the moment after _that_ was when Dorian’s life started going terribly wrong.


	2. Chapter 2

_The Free Marches_  
  
He still set all the captives free, of course. He did not remain for very long afterwards, but he would not leave even mages chained amongst a pile of bodies to die a slow lingering death.   
  
He took the mage who’d called him ‘Leto’ with him.   
  
The man was light: beneath the stubble that framed what was likely meant to be a mustache on better days, his features were pinched in a way that spoke of being hungry for longer than a few days worth of the meager fare slavers would give to their captives. He brought him back to his camp and set the man down, rekindling his own fire and searching the mage’s form for anything that he might recognize. There was nothing, no wellspring of fleeting images such as there had been when he’d laid eyes on Varania.   
  
But they had known each other. They must have- why else would he call him ‘Leto’?   
  
Perhaps Varania had sent him, Fenris realized with a stirring of unease.  
  
The only way to know for sure was to ask the man, who appeared to be out cold and likely to remain that way for some time without intervention. After a moment, Fenris uncorked one of the healing potions he carried, and carefully poured it into the man’s mouth.   
  
The man came around with a groan, and then immediately began to struggle, flailing wildly and knocking the remainder of the potion into the woods.   
  
“No! I’m not going back, I’m not-” A bit of flame appeared in his hands.  
  
Fenris released him. He scrambled back, staring at Fenris before his eyes widened in recognition. The flame disappeared.  
  
“ _Leto_ ,” he said again. “You’re-” He could see the moment when he remembered what had happened. “You rescued me. Leto, you-”  
  
“Do not call me that,” Fenris ordered.   
  
“What, Leto?” he asked.   
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Well. What do I call you, then?”  
  
“Fenris.”  
  
“Really?” the man asked, sounded baffled. “Why?”  
  
Fenris scowled.   
  
“Alright, it’s your name,” he muttered. “I just- Maker, it’s _you_. I was sure that I was going to miss you entirely- or worse, we’d end up on the same ship back home.”  
  
“You were looking for me?”  
  
“Yes, I wanted to warn you. It’s your sister. She’s-”  
  
“I’ve already run into Varania,” Fenris said flatly.   
  
“You did?” the man asked. “And Danarius?”  
  
“He’s dead,” Fenris said, watching the man’s reaction carefully. “I reached into his chest and crushed his heart.”  
  
“Oh, thank the Maker,” the man sighed, crumpling in on himself in relief. “Thank the Maker, I wasn’t sure that killing him was even _possible_.”   
  
Fenris had not been sure of that either. That made his reaction an encouraging one.   
  
“I don’t know who you are,” he admitted.   
  
“It’s- it’s been a long time, since we’ve seen each other,” the man said wryly, still blinking away tears of relief. “I’m Dorian.”  
  
Fenris waited.   
  
“Dorian of House Pavus,” he elaborated, searching Fenris’ face for any sign of recognition. Fenris had none to give him. “Please, tell me you remember House Pavus.”  
  
“I do not.”  
  
Dorian looked ill. “I’d heard- I mean, I couldn’t really trust anything your sister said, but she’d told me that you- do you remember anything at all from before Danarius got his claws into you?”  
  
“Very little,” Fenris replied.   
  
“Oh,” Dorian said softly. “I’m sorry. That’s- that sounds horrible.”  
  
“How did we meet?” Fenris asked, sidestepping the condolences.   
  
“When we were children,” Dorian said. “We grew up together.”  
  
Fenris still didn’t remember him, but he had a sudden flash of insight. Dorian of House Pavus, he’d said: so he was no illegitimate _verna_ , but an actual Altus, likely standing to inherit a seat in the Magisterium, likely owning-   
  
“I was your slave,” he said flatly.   
  
“Well, yes,” Dorian admitted.   
  
Had they not been in the center of his own camp, Fenris would have gotten up and walked away.

* * *

 _The Tevinter Imperium_  
  
Dorian roused himself from his dusk lotus-induced stupor when he heard a commotion coming from down the hall. Specifically, someone was crying, which was not a good thing to hear in a whorehouse. Generally speaking, crying was a sign that he should be taking his business elsewhere, and perhaps leaving a few scorch marks behind as a warning. He hoped that wasn’t the case here: he’d just paid for a lifetime membership.   
  
Besides, he’d rather liked the madame.   
  
The crying was coming from one of the nearby rooms. The door was open, and the madame was inside, standing between a mostly-naked, crying elven woman and an irate-looking man with a scorched shoulder.   
  
“You aren’t getting a refund for trying to take more than was on offer,” the madame was explaining. “You should consider yourself lucky if I let you leave without adding a few cuts. Get out.”  
  
“Just because I was a little rough,” the man began. Dorian cut him off with a blast of fire.   
  
“You were told to leave, I believe,” he said, casting a weak horror spell over the man- not enough to make him panic, but enough to making his heart and breathing speed up, to flood his system with the need to run. “Perhaps you should do so before I conjure up a fireball in your skull.”  
  
He left in quite the hurry.   
  
“Thanks Dorian, I owe you one,” the madame said.   
  
“Dorian?” the elf said tremulously.   
  
Dorian got a good look at her for the first time, and felt his jaw drop open as he recognized her.   
  
“ _Varania_?” he asked. “What are you-”  
  
She started sobbing again, burying her face in her hands.   
  
“Oh no,” he said. “Oh Varania, I’m so sorry.”  
  
“She’s got the rest of the week off,” the madame said with a significant look which said quite clearly that they were now even. “I’d tell you to be gentle, but seeing as I’ve met you…”  
  
“Yes, yes, you needn't worry about that, just let me go collect my things. I mean- would you like to go somewhere else, my dear?”  
  
Varania nodded.   
  
“Alright. I’ve got an apartment of sorts not too far from here. Let’s go there.”

* * *

 _Skyhold_  
  
It was Anders that the Inquisitor was most worried about. Josephine had been ringing her hands for weeks over the potential for diplomatic upsets ranging from tantrums in the main hall (already a twice-weekly occurrence) to sanctions to out-and-out war. But the mage kept his hood up and his face down and though Solas was looking at him oddly, no one seemed inclined to connect him with the mage who’d started this whole mess.   
  
One hurdle down, a great many more still to go.  
  
They went upstairs to the library, where Dorian was seated. He’d been intending to hurry them along this part, for sanity reasons, but the moment they came within sight of the Altus, Fenris peeled away from the main group and headed directly towards him.   
  
“Broody,” Varric called out warningly.   
  
Dorian looked up from his book then, and started slightly. He stood as Fenris drew nearer.   
  
“Paracelsus?” Fenris asked sparing a glance at the title of the book. “I thought you hated his work.”  
  
“I _abhor_ Paracelsus,” Dorian said, fighting to keep the smile from his face and losing badly. “Alas, he is the best of the bad bunch of books that’s calling itself the Inquisition’s library. I thought you wanted to stay in the Marches and away from all the Venatori.”  
  
“They are difficult to avoid these days, it seems,” Fenris replied.   
  
They stood there for a moment, grinning sappily at one another, and then Dorian threw his arms around the elf and held him close.  
  
 _Oh,_ thought the Inquisitor.  
  
“What the fuck?” demanded Hawke.


	3. Chapter 3

_The Free Marches_  
  
Let- Fenris sat across from him, watching with suspicious, impassive eyes as he ate and tried not to feel like a complete idiot. He should have just gone straight to Orlais, but he’d been so worried about what Danarius might do with Varania’s help…  
  
Varania hadn’t just been passing information on to Danarius, it seemed. His father had known that he would head to Kirkwall to warn Le-Fenris, and had hired those- those-  
  
They’d caught him, and they were going to drag him back to Tevinter in chains, hand him over to his father to perform blood magic on, sell the others, and make a tidy profit off the whole miserable venture. L- _Fenris_ had rescued them from that, but didn’t remember him, didn’t appear to want anything to do with him and _fasta vass_ he was such a fool. How had he thought this would go anyway? Even if he’d managed to warn him in time, even if he’d remembered Dorian, why would he feel any sense of closeness with someone who’d owned him and then kissed him well over half a lifetime ago?  
  
“It wasn’t- I mean, we weren’t like Danarius. We don’t torture our slaves,” Dorian tried. “We don’t use them for blood magic. They aren’t-” He fell silent as Fenris’ face became a little less impassive and a lot more annoyed.   
  
“Yes, tell me more about how well you treat your slaves,” he said. “Are they almost like people to you?”  
  
“I see your point,” Dorian said, sighing. “You’re right, of course, I don’t know why I’m defending…” He trailed off, remembering the details surrounding the sheer amount of blood his father would have needed to fix Dorian’s inconvenient defects, Varania’s sobbing form in the whorehouse, hearing what Leto’s choice of boon had been, and the way the thugs his father had sent after him had behaved. “I especially don’t know why I’m defending him, after what he’s done.”  
  
“Who’s he?” Fenris asked.   
  
“My father,” Dorian said bitterly. “Who hired those _lovely_ people we slaughtered not too long ago to bring me back home, to say nothing of what he did to your family. I’m sorry, I’m- I don’t know what else to say.”  
  
“What did your father do to my family?” Fenris demanded.   
  
It took effort to come up with a way to provide that answer without spiraling into apologies for both what happened and the way he still wanted to believe that this was all some kind of horrendous misunderstanding and his father hadn’t peeled off his mask to reveal the face of exactly the sort of man he’d raised Dorian to despise.  
  
“It’s more a matter of what he didn’t do, I suppose,” Dorian said at last. “You were supposed to be freed, your whole family was to be freed when Varania’s magic manifested.” He swallowed harshly, and found he couldn’t bring himself to put the silly adolescent dreams he’d had of their shared life in the Circle of Vyrantium in words, so he skipped over them. “I was told you _were_ freed: that Varania was studying in the Circle of Carastes, that your mother had found employment somewhere, and that you’d joined the army. No contact was possible, let alone permitted. I asked around to anyone with connections to Carastes anyway, but no one had heard of an elf named Varania. I’d assumed that she’d taken a new name when she was liberated, until I saw you at the Provings.”  
  
Fenris frowned at him. They sat in silence for a time.   
  
“Varania said that I’d competed for these markings,” he said at last.   
  
Dorian snorted. “It wasn’t like you knew that was what he was going to do to you. The prize was announced as ‘an honored place in my household, and a great boon’ not ‘I’m going to make you to subject of a highly experimental blood magic ritual to implant lyrium beneath your skin which will probably result in your death’. I don’t think you were there for yourself- I always had the impression that you were there for them, your family. It- it was a good fight, apparently. People still speak of it.”  
  
“You didn’t watch?” Fenris asked.   
  
“I was there,” Dorian said with a shrug. “I was also very drunk.”  
  
He hadn’t learned that Leto had survived until the next afternoon, when he woke up with the mother of all hangovers. He’d blamed that for the tears and vomit that had occurred shortly after Rilienus announced what his boon had been.

The silence descended upon them once more. Dorian finished sucking the meat from the nug leg Fenris had given him and tried not to notice how dawn had given way to morning. He was going to have to leave soon. What reason could there be to stay? The only thing he’d had to offer Fenris was a warning which was no longer needed.   
  
He should just go now, before Fenris felt compelled to shoo him away and he caused whatever it you called what would be considered a scene if you weren’t in the middle of the woods.   
  
“Thank you, for the rescue, and the meal,” Dorian said, standing up with as much dignity as he could muster. “I wouldn’t have liked to spend any more time in that cage, let alone be taken back to Tevinter in it. I have no way of repaying what you’ve done, but my gratitude, which- thank you.”  
  
He bowed, like they were nothing more than polite acquaintances (technically, he supposed they were) and turned to leave before he did something truly pathetic, like start to cry.  
  
“I did not retrieve your staff,” Fenris said before he’d taken more than three steps.  
  
“It’s not the first time I’ve gone without,” Dorian said with a shrug. He didn’t turn around. “Something will turn up.”  
  
“Like more of your father’s men?”   
  
“Probably,” he admitted. “Eventually. It’ll be some time before he learns these have failed.” He shrugged again. He still didn’t turn around. “It’s not always blatant kidnapping. Sometimes I’ll just get an invitation to tea from some distant relation or scholar that turns into an attempt to make me see sense.”  
  
“See sense how?”  
  
“My family and I disagree on several key points,” Dorian explained. “I suppose the main ones are my responsibility to marry and produce an heir, the value of honesty, and the repugnance of blood magic, in no particular order.”  
  
“And the disagreement is vehement enough that you find wandering around in a forest alone and unarmed preferable to returning home, and they find it palatable to have their only son and heir sent home as part of a slaver’s caravan?”  
  
Dorian sighed, gave in, and turned around. “I no longer have the coin to hire you as my body guard, Fenris.”  
  
“I am not suggesting that you hire me,” Fenris replied, arching his brow. “I am suggesting that the Planasene Forest is best not traveled on your own.”  
  
He had a point. He was also obviously faring much better on his own than Dorian, which made him suspect that he was being made the object of pity. That was almost worse, in a way, than being made the object of scorn. At least he deserved that.   
  
Still, there were times when you just had to suck up your pride and accept a bowl of soup from a Chantry sister and smile and nod during the sermon about the evils of magic that accompanied the meal. Or the offer of companionship from a childhood friend who didn’t remember him, much less feel anything for him, as it stood.  
  
“I don’t have any particular destination,” Dorian admitted.   
  
“Neither do I,” Fenris said. “I’ve been killing slavers, and they do not generally stay in one place. You have no objection, I trust?”  
  
“Slavers as in the thugs who as good as kidnap people from their homes and sell them on the black market for malificarum to work over? No, not in the slightest. The Imperium could do with fewer such people, to say nothing of the rest of Thedas.”  
  
“That is acceptable,” Fenris allowed.   
  
It wasn’t until they’d gotten the camp packed up and were headed out that Dorian realized that he’d never mentioned the fact that he was an only child to Fenris. He could have drawn his own conclusions from the fervor with which he parents wanted his return, of course, but maybe, just maybe, there was some part of him that remembered being Leto.

* * *

 _Skyhold_  
  
“How?” Varric demanded later, once they’d retreated to the Herald’s Rest. Anders was drawing a few odd looks (mostly from the bald apostate elf), but the sight of Fenris and Dorian sitting very close together and acting very friendly towards one another was a lot more distracting for the Inquisition’s members.  
  
Hawke kept her staff strapped to her back, just in case.   
  
“We met as children,” said Fenris.   
  
“He rescued me from my father’s men,” said Dorian at the exact same time.   
  
They snorted, shaking their heads with identical expressions of bemusement.   
  
“The amnesia muddles things a bit,” Dorian explained.   
  
Varric looked like he desperately wanted to be taking notes.   
  
“So if you knew each other as children, does that mean that Fenris was born free?” Anders asked.   
  
The loud silence that greeted his question was an answer in and of itself.   
  
“Seriously?” Anders demanded. Hawke kicked him under the table before he could start an argument that would give himself away.  
  
“He was supposed to have been freed,” Dorian said. “His entire family was supposed to be freed after Varania’s magic manifested.”  
  
“Dorian was told that we had been,” Fenris added.  
  
Dorian nodded. “I would have kicked up a much greater fuss if I’d known my father was lying, I assure you.”  
  
“Your father told you they’d been freed? Why?” the Inquisitor asked.   
  
“So I wouldn’t kick up a fuss, obviously,” Dorian said.   
  
“But why wouldn’t he just free them in the first place?”  
  
Fenris and Dorian exchanged looks, and then Dorian pulled in a deep breath before saying “Essentially, because I prefer the company of men.”  
  
“And I like sunset walks on the beach and candied pears?” Hawke replied.   
  
“My father disapproves,” Dorian added, which made _slightly_ more sense, kind of.   
  
“And I disapprove of waking up with cat hair in my mouth, but here I sit next to the crazy cat apostate anyway,” Hawke said.   
  
“You make it sound like I keep a pride of them,” Anders complained.   
  
“You do!”  
  
“There are only five-”  
  
“Seven. There are seven cats and every time I leave you alone for any length of time they start multiply,” Hawke moaned, before turning to the Inquisitor. “I do hope you’re not attached to your mousers, because we’re going to end up taking home approximately all of them.”  
  
“Yes, well, my father wasn’t quite so serene about my deficiencies,” Dorian said, which… seriously, what the fuck was Tevinter smoking to cultivate that kind of attitude?  
  
“As fascinating as this insight into Tevene cultural norms is,” Anders said, “I don’t understand what it has to do with why Fenris and his family weren’t freed.”  
  
“I do,” Isabela purred. The entire table turned to her. “He caught the two of you in flagrante delicto, didn’t he?”  
  
Dorian blushed bright red, which was quite the accomplishment for someone with his skin tone. “It wasn’t like _that_.”  
  
“He was fifteen,” Fenris said flatly, sending Isabela a warning look. “I’m older than he is.”  
  
She swallowed the jibe she was going to make about the libidos of the average fifteen year old boy.   
  
“How old were you?” Anders demanded, alarmed.   
  
“Eighteen,” Dorian said swiftly. “He was eighteen, there’s only a three year age gap, and we didn’t actually do much of anything. We kissed. That was it. It was our first kiss that he walked in on, if you must know.”  
  
“Oh,” Merrill cooed, her eyes lighting up. “You’re childhood sweethearts!”  
  
“No one is ever going to believe this,” Varric said, looking as though all his namedays had come at once. “And they’re going to eat it up with a spoon."

“Wait,” the Inquisitor interrupted. “He found you kissing someone who you obvious care about-”  
  
He paused.   
  
“Very much so,” Dorian admitted softly.   
  
The Inquisitor nodded, half to himself before continuing. “And then decided to sell his entire family to someone else rather than freeing them.”  
  
“That’s about the size of it,” Dorian said with a shrug.   
  
“Your father’s an asshole,” Hawke said.   
  
Dorian shrugged again.   
  
“When we next met, Dorian was in a cage. His father had contracted a group of slavers specializing in mage hunting to bring him back home,” Fenris informed them.  
  
“What?” yelled most of the table.   
  
Dorian blinked, looking taken aback. “Yes, I know, but- I’m fine, really. It ended well for me, as you can see.”  
  
“I can’t help but get the impression that I really should have punched your father in the face when we met,” the Inquisitor said. 

Fenris looked sharply at Dorian who sighed.   
  
“He came to discuss things,” he said. “Things were discussed. I’ll tell you about it later.”  
  
Fenris nodded, and an awkward silence descended upon them all.   
  
“So, moving on to cheerier topics, like, I don’t know, spirit possession or the Rite of Tranquility or Qunari politics…”  
  
“Funny you should mention those things,” the Inquisitor said.   
  
“Sweet Maker, I was _joking_ ,” Hawke groaned, thunking her head down on the table.

* * *

 

 _The Tevinter Imperium_  
  
Varania took it hardest, of course. A few short weeks ago, not only was she to be freed, but she was to be sent to the Circle of Vyrantium, where the heir of House Pavus would have made it clear that she was under his protection and a valued friend. Varania was clever and determined- she very easily could have become a magister with those advantages. Depending upon the political climate and the sort of match she made, she might even have lived to see one of her grandchildren marrying into an Altus family.  
  
Now, she was still a slave and likely to stay that way for a long while to come. They weren’t even house slaves any longer: they were _field hands_. Leto couldn’t really begrudge her how often she cried over it; sometimes- a lot of the time, if he were being honest- he felt like joining her.   
  
The only reason he didn’t was that this was all his fault, and holding it in was just about the only form of self-flagellation he had that wouldn’t make things worse. If he’d just waited a little longer, if he’d just kept his tongue to himself for one more day…

Magister Pavus had been furious. Leto had never seen him display his temper let alone lose it, but he had that night. He’d had Leto beaten. He’d nearly hit _Dorian_ when he tried to intervene. He’d been locked in the sweatbox for over a day, only to be deposited into a cell across from his mother and sister.   
  
Dorian had come to visit him that night. He’d plainly been crying, but he seemed determined to put on a brave face, so Leto didn’t call him on it.   
  
“The Circle of Carastes isn’t bad,” he said, passing a tangerine segment by segment through the bars of Leto’s cell window for him. “Your mother’s a skilled cook, and you’re a skilled fighter. I’m sure you’ll be able to find employment. It- I don’t think it’ll be terrible. It shouldn’t be terrible. I’ll- I’m not supposed to be in touch, but I’ll look for you anyway, I promise. And if you ever need anything… if you can get word to me through the Circle of Vyrantium, I’ll respond.”  
  
They weren’t going to Carastes for Varania to learn magic, if they were to go to Carastes at all. Leto knew that, but didn’t tell him. Dorian wouldn’t stand for it if he knew. He would confront his father, and then-  
  
Who knew what Magister Pavus might do then? It wouldn’t improve his family’s fortunes, he was sure, and he might even lash out and hurt Dorian on top of that. So here they were now, working from before sunup until sundown under the watchful eyes of a man who kept placing his hands on Mother while leering past Leto at Varania.  
  
“I’m going to fix this,” he promised as Varania conjured some ice over the blisters on his hand. “I’ll make this right, I swear.”  
  
“Haven’t you done enough?” she hissed bitterly, and jerked away to tend to Mother.

**Author's Note:**

> As per usual, we can blame this on the [kink meme](http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/13890.html?thread=56944706#t56944706):
> 
> "When Hawke comes to Skyhold, he brings all of his companions with him, since Varric's letter made it sound like the Inquisition could use all the help it can get. When they arrive, before they get officially introduced to the Inquisitor's companions, Varric warns Fenris that one of them is a Tevinter mage, and it would be really nice if they could avoid shouting, arguments and especially tearing out hearts. Fenris doesn't look like he's willing to play nice.
> 
> ... so imagine everyone's surprise when Dorian and Fenris apparently recognize each other, and hug instead of fighting.  
> I leave their past history up to the author, I only ask for no dub/non-con between them :)
> 
> \+ if the Inquisitor (any race/class is fine by me) was planning to romance Dorian, but backs off when he sees Dorian and Fenris together"


End file.
